The age of the driverless vehicle is nearly upon us, being accelerated by the expansion of mobile computing and telecommunications. Applicant is actively working in the field known as the Connected Vehicle (CV) initiative. Current efforts are underway to develop Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) applications and technologies that provide the ability for cars to “talk” to each other and “talk” to the road infrastructure. USDOT, auto manufacturers, and private sector firms like Google, Qualcomm, and others are making significant investment in such products and services that offer improved vehicle safety, security, mobility, and environmental benefits.
A key challenge to realizing the CV market is that the entire auto industry must adopt and install uniform standard technology in each new vehicle and also provide after-market devices for existing consumer vehicles. CV mobile applications that support Mobile-to-Mobile (M2M), Mobile-to-Vehicle (M2V), and Mobile-to-Infrastructure (M2I) data exchange will need to be developed. These new CV mobile applications can be disruptive, enabling, and game changers.
Instead of waiting for all car manufacturers to equip all new vehicles with standard CV technology, a consumer would instead be able to use their mobile smartphone in a vehicle to, for example, send a safety warning message to another vehicle or to a pedestrian that it is in the vehicle's blind spot. This addresses a safety benefit of CV mobile apps, but another large untapped market opportunity is in mobility and security of freight. The CV may also improve mobility and security for transporting shipping containers on land.
The U.S. is served by 360 commercial marine ports. Roughly 16 Million shipping containers enter U.S. ports each year. These containers, when they arrive at a port, must be moved landside. Drayage trucks for hire haul these containers from the port to a warehouse or a yard, and then from the yard to its interim or final destination. Each of these drayage movements involve different contracts and different companies, with none of these necessarily being linked to one another. Additionally, shipping containers must be transported on a unique trailer “chassis” and a unique driver-truck combination. Trucks must be properly credentialed and drayage drivers are required to carry a DHS-TSA Transportation Worker ID Card (TWIC). There are a multitude of transactional assignments and verifications surrounding a single container transport move thus resulting in an inefficient and costly operation. There is currently no all-encompassing capability or data source existing for track and trace in-transit visibility of shipping containers and assets performing services at ports, borders, intermodal yards. Further given that there are multiple diverse and competing business interests amongst current drayage stakeholders such a system and process would be difficult to implement. Further still, in view of stringent security and other requirements surrounding ports, deemed “critical infrastructure”, and port operations, adoption of technology in the drayage market has been slow. Drayage companies currently dispatch is via paper, telephone or text instruction and there is no centralized data source for stakeholders to leverage to make better operational business decisions.
Taking a step back, FIG. 1 schematically illustrates the various entities and relationships impacting the drayage process. Although drayage generally refers to the transport of goods over a short distance, usually as part of a longer haul, shipping and port/terminal operations and processes directly impact drayage. Accordingly, we see in FIG. 1 that multiple Ports, Shippers/Shipping Lines, Terminal Operators and, of course, Drayage Companies and their Drivers are key players in the process. Additionally, various Government Agencies including the Port Authorities, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Transportation Security Administration (TSA), and other Federal, State, and Local agencies have a stake in the cargo moving process and depend on timely and quality information for enabling safe, secure, and efficient movement of imported into and exported freight. A brief summary of each entity-type and their corresponding parts in the process are further described below.
Drayage Drivers are a vital element in the drayage process. They are required to possess a commercial driver's license, pass a physical exam every 2 years, and comply with all federal, state, local regulations. In addition, specific to U.S. ports which are deemed “critical infrastructure”, drivers must qualify and possess a Transportation Worker Identification Card (TWIC) to enter a terminal operator's yard. Operationally, drivers depend on drayage company dispatch orders to pick-up or drop-off shipping containers and a trip-leg can be as short as 1 mile to 100 miles. Drivers can be company employees or contracted independent operators and earn compensation based on the number of completed dispatch order in a given work day.
Drayage Companies are hired to transport the shipping container from a local warehouse and deliver it to the origin port terminal operator yard. Likewise, the Drayage Company retrieves the container then from the destination port, in and out of the port terminal operator yard. Drayage companies rely on a combination of employee drivers and company fleet trucks as well as independent owner-operators who may individually own their own trucks and hired to transport containers.
Freight Customer is the owner of the cargo packed into a leased shipping container and sometimes referred to as the Beneficial Cargo Owner (BCO). The freight customer may also contract out the responsibility for the transport to a freight forward agent importer/exporter and/or a Third Party Logistics (3PL) agent who administers oversees and manages the entire movement of the containerized freight by contracting for each leg move of the end-to-end transport service.
Terminal Operators exist at both the origin location port and at the destination port. They are contracted at the origin location port to receive the shipping container (hauled in by a drayage truck/driver) into their yard and stack/hold until time to load onto a ship for transport. At the destination port, a terminal operator unloads the container from the ship and stacks/stores until such time a drayage truck/driver arrive to haul away to the freight customer warehouse location, usually within 100 miles from the port.
Shipping Lines are contracted to haul containers overseas from origin port-to-destination port. Shipping Lines either own or lease shipping containers used to transport freight. While certain companies have their own fleet of containers and use them solely for their own shipping requirements globally, no single shipping line in the world can operate with just their fleet of containers and usually lease containers from lease companies from time to time depending on the demand.
Referring to FIGS. 2a-2d, examples of various basic drayage dispatch moves are shown. Drayage dispatch moves represent the dispatch orders to drivers regarding short distance container movements. FIG. 2a illustrates an exemplary 2 leg trip; often completed over two days which represents two transactions. FIG. 2b illustrates a live load where both legs are completed in a single day transaction. FIG. 2c illustrates a one way, single move transaction (container) and FIG. 2d illustrates a similar one way, single move transaction (chassis).
The ability to efficiently and effectively move and track cargo is not only critical to the financial success of all of the participating entities shown in FIG. 1, but is equally critical for supply chain security as well as for curbing environmental impacts. It is estimated that over 100M shipping containers are moved landside each year globally with about 16M/year at US ports alone. The embodiments help address safety and security issues related to moving containers. US cargo theft is estimated at $30B annually and over 80% as whole container/truckload with “deceptive pick up” is the fastest growing method. This is of key interest to port authorities, federal agencies such as DHS, CBP, TSA and USDOT, state agencies such as highway safety-patrol and transportation officials. Also local authorities are now focused on port sustainable communities where diesel trucks operate nearby negatively affect the health and well-being of families/households living nearby—leading to environmental restrictions and the need to effectively monitor regulatory compliance while optimizing goods movement.
Accordingly, there is a perpetual need in the drayage industry for ways to better manage the drayage process. In addition to the obvious benefit to drayage operators, other entities who are interested in safe and secure container movements, such as terminal operators, port authorities, federal agencies (DHS, USDOT, etc.), cargo owners, container owners, chassis owners, freight forwarders, and final destination recipients would also benefit from improvements.